mail: daniel_fjall@hotmail.com
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goodbye yellow brick road
Goodbye Yellow Brick Road Elton John is one of those artists people never can kick on enough. He’s written music for Disney, doing benefit gigs with Eric Clapton, Phil Collins and Sting. All people you’re always allowed to give a decent bashing every now and then. Even if his music did great sales in the 80’s, it wasn’t very good. In fact, it was so terrible (and maybe the undeserved success added to it) that critics and so-called music lovers joined forces despising his music so much that they completely forgot about his work a decade earlier. In the 70’s (1970-1975, more exactly) Elton was one of the greatest male vocalists out there, one fine tunesmith and an important visionary whom managed to reach the masses with his glamrock in a way David Bowie never did. The double-album Goodbye Yellow Brick Road should probably be regarded as his peak. Maybe it’s slightly too long and people might find some of his other excellent albums around this time more enjoyable, but for me, this is the one. Because whilst it is long, it also gives Elton the chance to fill it with all his influences and different styles, which makes it a diverse and intriguing listen. There are the tender, radiofriendly ballads (“Candle In The Wind”), glamrock (“Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting”), genius pop (the title track), catchy r’n’b (“Bennie And The Jets”) and even prog (“Funeral For A Friend/Love Lies Bleeding”, arguably his best song ever). Some of the new investigations might come off as rather dumb and clumsy (as the stab at reggae in “Jamaica Jerk Off”), but it always is entertaining. The boogie song “Your Sister Can’t Twist” is one of the numbers that could easily be written off as junk, but it gets me because of the attitude, the silly Beach Boys-harmonies and the band knows it’s more of a joke and not a serious song. Despite the all pointy angles and different styles, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road still sounds as a solid unit and really comes together as an album. It is a minor masterpiece and opening “Funeral For A Friend/Love Lies Bleeding” on it’s own should earn Elton a bashing-free-life (not that he’ll ever get it), and most of these songs are, or at least should-have-been, classics. What else can you expect from a guy at top of his game, combining the rolling piano of Jerry Lee Lewis and the sophistical pop ideas of Lennon/McCartney?
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